Before the Storm
by LittleLotte17
Summary: Temple of Mythal happened-Solas is mad. Ancient elves are jerks- Lavellan is mad. Words are said and shouted. Things are thrown. Some of them are pants. I wonder if the trees got jealous?


AN: Translations for the elven are at the bottom. I...have never tried to write an actual smut scene so...I am just going to leave this here and awkwardly crab scuttle away so I can go die of embarrassment somewhere.

Rated M for sexy times

Disclaimer:If I owned this, we would have gotten a Solas sex scene in DAI. As it is, I had to write one.

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Solas was in a foul mood, as he had been since the temple of Mythal. Why hadn't the Inquisitor heeded him? Of all the times to ignore his counsel, she had to choose _this_ one. She had thrown away her own free will on a whim, and now she was lost to him in a way she didn't even fully comprehend. Likely sensing his ire, she had been pointedly avoiding him since then, but she_ would _hear him now. That is, if he could find her.

Aili was not in any of her usual haunts. She was not perched in any of the trees in the garden, nor reading out in the sun on the tavern's roof, the kitchen staff said she hadn't pestered them all day, and Josephine told him that there was to be no war council until tomorrow. He had been searching for over an hour and he was starting to wonder if she was in Skyhold at all. He stormed past the tavern for the fourth time in less than twenty minutes, so caught up in his own frustrations that he nearly ran headlong in to Cole as he came out the front door.

"Hello, Solas." The spirit boy greeted him calmly, adjusting his hat. "Did you lose something?"

"I am sorry, Cole," the mage apologized, "Have you seen the Inquisitor?"

"Yes?" He replied in confusion, "I've seen her lots of times, but still not as many as you."

"I mean, do you know where she is?" the elf explained, exasperation bleeding through his usual patience for the spirit's lack of understanding.

"Oh," Cole blinked and tilted his head slightly, as if listening for something far away, "Not here, but not far. Thoughts of moving like a shadow, quick and quiet, '_remember how'_. She knew before the magic came. Draw back to the cheek, arms strong and supple like the dead tree in her hands. _'Hit the mark!' _The deer gut cuts at her fingers, red and raw and rife with rage. The _Vir Tanadahl_, the grass between her toes feels like freedom and the memories of so many marked faces smiling, full of pride and love. The walkers of the lonely path. They looked at her to see their future. _'Remember who you are. No matter how they bend you, you __**will not**__ break'_."

"Thank you, Cole." Solas sighed, some of his anger seeping from him.

"You're still upset," the spirit noted, "Did I help?"

"You did," the mage assured him, "I think I know where she is now."

As expected, Solas found the Inquisitor in a little pine grove of about a half an hour outside of Skyhold, angrily shooting arrows at the knotholes of the trees. She had pulled her hair free from its customary ponytail, letting it fall about her shoulders in a silver-blonde halo, and kicked her expensive antivan leather boots out into the bushes in a fit of pique. She looked feral and furious, covered in dirt and scratches with large rips in the silken shirt Josephine had ordered her from Orlais. Yet there was something proud and willful in her stance the he found incredibly alluring.

"Vehnan," He called to her softly with a roughness in his voice he hadn't planned on. It was hard to stay angry at her when she could steal his breath with a glance. She froze, her arm drawn back to take another shot, but she did not turn to face him.

"Tel'emma da'len." She declared coldly. She loosed the arrow and it hit its mark with a loud thud.

"I know," Solas told her in a low voice, stepping up behind her and enjoying the way she shivered at their proximity. "In fact," He whispered mischievously, sliding one hand around her waist, "I believe I know it better than most." He gently tugged at her hair to make her head tilt and bare part of her neck, allowing him to place a lingering kiss just beneath her delicate pointed ear. She shuddered and relaxed back into his embrace, but remained glaring irately at the trees even as a bright pink blush spread across her cheeks.

"Abelas called me a Shemlen." Aili grumbled with an almost petulant frown.

"As I am afraid we all must seem to one who is immortal," Solas consoled her casually, uncertain if he liked where this conversation was heading. As he feared, she stepped out if his arms to look at him, confusion and great offense warring on her face.

"_No_," the Dalish mage began, the heat returning to her voice, "Not '_we_'. He called_ me_ shemlen. He openly mocked me, and treated me the same as any human who had come to rob the place! But not you. Why is that?"

"You are reading too much into this." Solas said lightly, his smile not quite reaching his eyes.

"He called you '_Elvhen_'!" She accused, frustrated with his dodging, "A true elf. One of the People! _You_, with your bare face, and your disdain for the Creators and your self-taught magic!" His expression soured at her words. "Don't give me that look, you know I don't think less of you for any of that, it's just... Why you? Why you and not me?"

"Perhaps because I did not assume as you did, as the Dalish _always_ do, that every elf must feel some sort of kinship based solely on the shape of our earlobes." He deflected harshly.

"Careful," Aili growled, "You're starting to sound like Sera. You know, the city elf you're always trying to browbeat into learning elven lore?"

"Your people fumble in the dark, lost and helplessly calling the names of those they know nothing about with pride," He spat, "They bleat prayers to gods who never answer, mindlessly repeating legends as though they were truths and belittling those who do not cast their lives aside to join them in their ignorance! _I_ walk the Fade, observing the ancient memories of the Elvhen and gaining the knowledge of my people from spirits as old as Arlathan itself!"

"_Your_ people?!" the Dalish exclaimed in disbelief, "Because clearly the legacy of the elves belongs solely to you."

"I meant, our people," Solas backpedaled hastily, but it was too late.

"No. You didn't." The Inquisitor began, rage quaking through her voice, "So_...this_ is what you truly think of me?"

"Not_ you_-" He insisted before she managed to cut him off.

"Just _my people_!" She shouted in indignation, "I'm one of them, Solas. I'm not going to stop being Dalish, no matter what Cassandra or Sera or even _you_ have to say about it. We're good people who look out for each other, which is more than most humans can boast, and it's nothing that you or Sera have any right to turn your nose up at." Aili paused to scoff at him, "You 'walk the Fade', and you 'speak to spirits', but you're no better than that poor ignorant city elf, in your way. Do you know what my Keeper told me? 'If you only look in front of you, someone's bound to stab you in the back, but if you only look behind you, one of these days your liable to walk off a cliff, Da'len. Best to be mindful of both, when you can.'"

"And_ this_ is what you think of _me_?" Solas asked sourly. "Some fool so mired in the past he can't even see where he's going?"

"I-" She sputtered for a moment before tossing her bow to the ground in frustration and stomping her foot, "I _don't know_! I don't know _what_ to think of you, and the more I thought about it, the more it terrified me. I've known you for almost three years, I've eaten with you, fought beside you, laughed and kissed and cried with you and yet...I'm not certain I understand you any more than I did that first morning in Haven when you smiled at me and I thought that you had pretty eyes."

"You think I have pretty eyes?" the apostate repeated with and arched brow, torn between amusement and a general sense of befuddlement.

"Sure, _that's_ the part you focus on," She huffed at him, heat rising in her cheeks. He laughed. A smile twitched across her face briefly, but it melted into sadness as she met his gaze. "_Mythal enaste, _Solas, I-" She froze, realizing what she had just said. She looked around for a few seconds, a hint of fear lurking in her eyes, then she glanced back at him and start laughing.

"M-mythal!" She gasped out between peals of slightly crazed amusement, tearing her fingers through her pale blond locks. "Anduril, Elgar'nan, Falon'Din, Sylaise... Ghilan'nain." She ran her fingers across the swirls of the bronze colored vallaslin on her forehead as she fell to her knees, "_Real_. They're all really real. I can feel the truth of it echoing in my heart." Her voice was a mix of awe and raw terror.

"I thought you had always believed in them?" Solas asked as he took a seat on the ground in front of her.

"Well, yes, but..." She dug her fingers into the grass as though she was trying to cling to the earth before forces beyond her control had the chance to wrench her away and hurl her across the mountainside, "I thought they were just...spirits or something. _Real_, but still not quite like people. I love the tales the Hahren tell because they are _ours_, and I refuse to see how they are any less ridiculous than the story the Chanrty sings. Besides, every legend has a kernel of truth at it center, right? I just figured the Creators were spirits our ancestors called on for aid... Justice, Compassion, or Valor, but...that is not what Mythal is. Her mind touched mine when she took control of my body at the alter and it was...I'm not even sure I can describe it. More than the single minded purpose of a spirit, more than a mage, just..._more_. Ancient and endless and..._hungry_."

"Why did you drink from the well?" Solas asked her with a shake of his head, some of his frustration from earlier returning. "I _begged_ you not to! Why could you not have heeded me?"

"Because it was _ours_." She declared passionately, glaring up at him with tears brimming in her eyes, her bottom lip trembling. "It belongs to my people just as surely as you and Sera and Abelas do. You might not claim the Dalish as your people, but _we _claim _you_. We _are_ the People, and Mythal is still our mother, and I was hers before the first sip of water passed my lips. I was trained to be a Keeper, taught to seek out and preserve the remnants of our past. I wasn't about to hand that over to some Shem apostate who speaks in nothing but cryptic half truths. Do you really think Morrigan would have shared the knowledge of the well with us?"

"...Perhaps not," Solas admitted reluctantly, "but Aili...you will never truly belong to yourself again."

"I'm _Dalish_," she reminded him softly, cupping his face in her hands, "My life has never belonged solely to me. I have always belonged to my people and their future, and now I also belong to the Inquisition and...to you."

"It is not the same!" He protested, but he leaned his forehead against hers. He was more sad than anything. She was just one more thing he'd been helpless to save.

"Maybe it isn't," she conceded in a whisper. She stared at him a moment, something close to hopelessness flashing in her eyes. "We...we're _trying_," Aili told him, her voice thick with emotion, "We seek the old ruins, the old writings, we try to understand, we yearn for it in a way I'm not even sure I know how to describe. We're like an old man desperately trying to recall the days of his youth, but the memory of it has grown dim with age. All we want is to be who we are, to know our past and to build our future. Is that such a terrible thing?"

"No," Solas admitted, "I suppose it is not." He watched her in silence for a moment as she stared at the grass between her knees, an expression of anguish still fixed upon her face. "What is this truly about, Vehnan?"

"I..." She trailed off, twisting her fingers together, looking guilty, "I miss them. _All_ of them. The clan was my family, my whole world before all this- this..._shit_ happened. Not that I mind learning more about the world, and I'm glad to have met everyone here, and I know what we're doing is important, but..."

"You are homesick." He summarized gently.

"I suppose that must sound childish to a man who spent most of his life exploring new places by himself and studying in the Fade." Aili commented glumly. He rose to his knees and closed the space between them, drawing her slowly into his arms.

"Not at all," He assured her as his mind drifted to distant memories of towering crystal spires shining in the sun. He nuzzled the crown of her head as she ducked beneath his chin to hide her face in his chest. She inhaled sharply, breathing him in as he leaned back into a sitting position, pulling her onto his lap.

"It's so lonely here," she mumbled from somewhere in the fabric of his tunic, "They put me at the center of everything, and somehow still...apart. The 'Herald' to some woman I don't even acknowledge as divine. I thought that at least you or Sera would make it more like home, but you don't. I'm too elfy for her, and I'm not elfy enough for you." Solas drew back far enough to look her in the eye.

"You are more than enough for me, Vehnan." He assured her, kissing her forehead.

"Then why do you hold me at arm's length?" She asked, sounding hurt, "Why do you keep me away, even now?"

"You seem to be much closer than that at present," He quipped with the hint of a grin. She gave an aggravated sigh.

"You think you're so fucking clever," She grumbled. He chuckled warmly and began kissing a trail down the smooth tan skin of her throat.

"I thought my cleverness was one of the things you enjoyed about me." He said with an air of mock offense.

"If you aren't going to answer me, you could at least find a better use for your tongue and than teasing me." She complained, but there was a hint of mischief lurking in her tone.

"But I enjoy teasing you," He told her with a grin, bumping his nose against hers playfully. "And I believe _you_," he punctuated the word with a brief peck on her lips, "rather enjoy being teased, Vehnan."

Aili chased after his mouth, and the kiss she plied him with was deep and gentle, almost pleading. She twined her arms about his neck, shifting her knees to either side of his hips and pressing herself along his torso. Not grinding, not thrusting, just...intimate; closeness for the sake of feeling close. He held her there, but otherwise submitted to her attentions. When she drew back and blinked up at him, her violet eyes where swimming with doubts and unanswered questions. She placed her hand over his heart.

"Na vehnan ma?" She whispered, a slight tremor in her voice.

"Ma sa'nehn," He replied seriously, "Sahlin." He kissed the right side of her neck, just below her jaw. "Mahvir." He kissed the left side. "Uthen."

Aili knocked him back onto the grass, their teeth scraping together as she roughly sealed his mouth with her own. He gave a slight grunt of surprise before sliding his tongue along hers, eliciting a moan. She burned against him, lithe and wriggling as he gripped her backside firmly with both hands and pressed her hips down into his own, trying to meld them into a single being.

Despite her earlier revelations about her gods, _she_ was to the one who was real. _Too_ real. True and bright and fleeting. A single ray of sunlight piercing through a cloud covered sky. He would have given almost anything to hold her in this place, young and strong, and loving him.

Aili bit his lip harshly as he ran his hands up under her torn silken shirt, mapping the soft curves of her rib cage, her shoulder blades, her spine. She slithered out of her top and tossed it carelessly out into the bushes. He groaned. She had gone without a breast band. He instantly redirected his attentions to her chest, kneading her small breasts with long warm fingers. She hissed with pleasure whenever he rolled a nipple between a forefinger and thumb. Her kisses grew sloppy and eager, and she rubbed herself against his obvious arousal, demanding.

"You," She panted against his ear, dragging her teeth lightly along the lobe, "are wearing _far_ too much clothing." Her nimble fingers made quick work of the belt at his waist before slipping their way up under his tunic, grazing the muscles of his abdomen with her nails.

Solas sat up slightly, trying to aid in the process of undressing while losing as little contact with her as possible. She yanked his shirt up impatiently, getting it caught under his arms. He fumbled for a few seconds as he fought to extract his limbs and, with Aili's assistance, managed to get the offending piece of clothing stuck on the way over his head instead. She snickered.

"I like you like this," the Dalish mage smiled fondly, freeing his face from the confines of cloth.

"Trapped and ridiculous?" He grumbled, balling the shirt up and tossing it in the same direction she had thrown hers.

"It's good to know you are capable of typical male bumbling," she explained with a smirk, running her fingers along his collarbone. "and I like that the only one who tends to see it is me." She leaned their foreheads together. "It makes you feel more..._mine_."

It was Solas' turn to push her to the ground then, kissing her like a drowning man seeking air. He couldn't be everything he wanted to be for her, everything she deserved. He couldn't even truly become the man he pretended to be; this make believe man that she loved. But he could give her this moment, these endless affections, this fire she had kindled within him. Though it was hard to convince himself that it was solely for her benefit when Aili was laying half naked in the grass, his name on her lips and her hair fanned out around her face like a wreath of pale flames. She looked like a goddess.

"_Pants_," She complained breathlessly, "Why are we wearing pants?" He chuckled warmly as he began trailing open mouthed kisses down her chest. She gave a gasp of approval when he paused his exploration long enough to swirl his tongue around the peak of her left breast, sucking firmly as he dug his fingers into the waistband of her trousers and began the process of shimmying them down her slender hips.

A few more moments of tugging and pulling and twisting and kicking saw them both free of what remained of their clothes. He moved his right hand down towards her entrance, fully intending to remind her that his fingers could be as clever as his tongue, but she wrapped her legs around his hips firmly, tired of waiting, sick of space. Hardly less eager than the younger elf under him, Solas placed his hands on either side of her head, savoring the expression on her face as his slowly pushed into her. Her back bowed dramatically, the keen that broke past her lips was music to his ears.

They moved together in a dance they had practiced a dozen times before, their bodies slick and sinuous as they rode to the heights of their passion. Aili's neck and chest were peppered with dark love bites. Solas' back was a sea of scratches and little half moon indentations from where her nails had dug into his broad shoulders, desperate for something to cling to as the rest of the world fell away. Near the end, he hiked her right leg over his arm, the sharp movements of his hips finally thrusting deeper, the new angle just enough to make her lose the last shred of her control, screaming wordlessly as she came apart in his arms. His own end arrived soon afterwards, her face contorted in the throws of ecstasy more than enough to undo him.

He collapsed onto his elbows, careful not to rest his full weight on her, and pressed his forehead against hers, enjoying the way their labored breathing mingled in his mouth. She gave a contented little hum in the back of her throat, nuzzling their noses together, which Solas took as his cue to roll to one side. She promptly moved her head to his shoulder, throwing an arm and a leg across him possessively, as if he might try to escape her clutches. The stayed like that for a few minutes, basking in the sleepy afterglow of their love making, the mountain air cooling the sweat on their tacky limbs as their rushing pulses slowly returned to normal. He had almost drifted to sleep when she spoke.

"Solas?" Aili asked him suddenly, sounding pleasantly worn out.

"Hm?" He managed to reply.

"If...if the rest of them are real...do you think _he's_ real, too?" There was a slight tremor of fear in her voice, and her grip on him tightened marginally.

"The Maker?" The older elf asked sleepily, uncertain why that would be such a cause for concern.

"No..._Fen'Harel_." She whispered the name as though he might be lurking in the trees behind them, waiting for his chance to strike. Solas stiffened, suddenly very awake.

"I...suppose he must be, wouldn't you think?" He said quietly, struggling to keep his tone casual. He felt her swallow thickly. "Is he truly so frightening? Mythal was, as you said, not what you thought her to be. If he is real, do you think he would be able to live up to the terrible picture the Dalish have painted of him?"

"I...don't know," She admitted, "It's just that...we were all so scared of him. I took my friend Daewyn's share of the blackberries we picked one time and he told me the Dread Wolf was going to eat me because I had been bad. I remember crying the whole way home. I believed him. When I got older...I guess I just thought of him as a demon. Who isn't afraid of the monster lurking in the dark, right? It makes sense to give evil a name, a face, something to curse at when things go wrong, but if he was _real_... Wouldn't it frighten you to know the being you thought you had grown out of fearing is something that could actually exist and want to hurt you?"

"We know he did not kill Mythal," Solas pointed out, trying his best not to sound bitter, "and Abelas seemed less than impressed by Morrigan's repetition of Dalish lore. Perhaps the Dalish are mistaken in their tales about the Dread Wolf as well."

"Perhaps," She conceded thoughtfully, "but...even if he wasn't evil...even if he wasn't the monster we thought he was... Why was he left behind when the other gods left?"

"Maybe he chose to stay," he said quietly, "Maybe he sealed the gods away with good reason, and could not follow them afterwards."

"He must have been lonely," Aili commented with a yawn. He squeezed her shoulder and kissed the top of her head. A few moments passed in silence and the older mage thought she might have fallen asleep.

"Solas?" She asked again, her voice even more sleep fogged than before.

"Yes, Vehnan?" He replied with a sigh, almost dreading where this new line of questions would turn.

"I can wait," she said faintly, even as she hugged him a bit tighter.

"For what?" he asked, genuinely confused.

"For you to tell me your secrets," She told him, "I can wait as long as it takes for you to be ready to share with me." He gave a dry huff of laughter.

"That seems a large promise with little gain for you," he informed her. "Why?"

"Because I love you." She said it as though it were the most simple thing in the world. He kissed the high bridge of her nose for it, and she promptly wrinkled the feature at him, making him laugh.

"And what if I never feel like sharing?" He asked, his tone teasing, but the truth of it shown brightly in his gaze. Luckily for him, her eyes were closed.

"You will," She assured him confidently.

"Is that so?" He asked, amusement rumbling in his voice.

"Mm-hmm," she answered, cracking her violet eyes open to peer up at him and running her fingers along his jaw. "Because _you_," she pulled his face down to her and kissed him deeply to prove her point, "love me, too."

"I do, indeed." Solas answered sadly. He held her as she fell asleep, taking comfort in the deep even sounds of her breathing. He would either have to end this soon, or...tell her. And he was uncertain which of those two options sounded worse. He had thought that their attraction was something that would fizzle out in a few months, and then they would have broken it off, been awkward around each other for a few days, and moved past it. This...was so much more. Wonderful and terrifying and completely impossible. She wanted to spend the rest of her life with him...and that was something he could never offer her. No matter how much he wanted to.

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AN: Let's Learn Elven with Lotte! (j/k I actually just sort of threw it together)

Tel'emma da'len- I am not a child

Na vehnan ma?- (is) your heart mine?

Ma sa'nehn- you are my one/only joy.

Sahlin- now/in this moment

Mahvir- tomorrow

Uthen- technically 'Uth' is eternal/endless and 'en' makes something plural, but I'm using it for 'forever' or 'for all of time'


End file.
